Acer was one of the first companies (after Apple) to support Intel's nascent Thunderbolt high-speed port in its systems back in 2012. Fast-forward a year, however, and the PC maker has determined that Thunderbolt is no longer part of its company's future plans.

An Acer spokesperson has told our sister site CNET that the company will no longer include Thunderbolt on its laptops and desktops, instead relying on USB 3.0 for high-speed data transfer between its systems and peripherals.

The move will come as a blow to Thunderbolt, which has been fully embraced on Mac computers but has only been used sporadically on Windows PCs -- usually higher-end models. Nonetheless, Intel told CNET that several companies like Asus, Dell, and Lenovo have added Thunderbolt support to their new Haswell-based systems, and that Thunderbolt is being promoted for higher-end machines.

For its part, Apple will be including Thunderbolt 2, which doubles throughput to 20Gbps, with its forthcoming revision of the MacPro desktop. That will keep well ahead of the USB standard, which won't reach 10Gbps until next year. Still, USB 3.0's throughput of 5Gbps appears to be more than enough for most computer buyers -- and manufacturers.

Is Thunderbolt support on your checklist for a new system? Let us know in the Talkback section below.